Australian Government Solicitor

Australian Government Solicitor (AGS) is a Commonwealth government agency established to provide legal services to the Government of Australia and its agencies.

AGS was originally the Crown Solicitor's Office which was established on 1 July 1903 on the appointment of Charles Powers as the first Commonwealth Crown Solicitor. With a major restructure of the Attorney-General's Department in 1983-4, the Crown Solicitor's Office became the Office of the Australian Government Solicitor, with acting Crown Solicitor Tom Sherman appointed the first Australian Government Solicitor. Some functions of the Crown Solicitor's Office were transferred to other parts of the Attorney-General's Department. In 1999, the Australian Government Solicitor ceased being an office held by an individual, and instead became a government business enterprise, headed by a CEO, separate from the Attorney-General's Department. On 1 July 2015, AGS was consolidated within the Attorney-General's Department as a functionally independent group under a lawyer titled the 'Australian Government Solicitor'.

Some Commonwealth legal work, including constitutional law, is 'tied' work that only AGS is able to perform as solicitor on behalf of the Commonwealth.